Feeling The Heat
by LadyVibeke87
Summary: Ziva and Tony end up locked in a container under the August sun, and someone completely unexpected comes in their rescue. Someone who, despite everything, is not a saviour at all. Someone who wants to take from Ziva what Ziva took from them. [Tiva]
1. Feeling The Heat

"I swear, next time we're sent out to uncover some weapons-smuggling, they'll have to step on my dead body before I accept." Ziva said, firing three shots, then withdrew behind the corner, back smoothed against a wall, holding her gun firmly as she peered out of her hiding place, ready to shoot again. Compressed next to her in the same position, Tony smirked.

"Kinda déjà vu, isn't it?"

They backed away when the machine-gun started blasting bullets in their direction. Ziva clinched her teeth impatiently.

"I'm going to kill him with my own hands."

"Easy, princess, I don't want to have to tell your daddy his little girl was murdered by a smuggling freak."

Not listening to a word, Ziva sneaked a peek again as soon as the noise stopped, just in time to see the guy slinking into one of the open containers.

"He's run out of munitions." She stated, charging her gun. "It's the right moment to-"

"No way, don't even think about that!" Tony anticipated, horrified. "I'm not stepping into one of those boxes again."

"Okay," Ziva said, and he relaxed. "You wait here, I'll go and get him."

He grabbed her arm one second before she could slip away like a cat in the night.

"Ziva, be sensible for once… We don't even know what he's got in there."

"That thing wouldn't be open if something dangerous or important was stored in it." She insisted, breaking free from him. "I promise you I won't hurt him… Too much. You can stay here and cover me, in case someone else shows up."

"I hate it when you do that." Tony groaned.

"Do what?" asked Ziva blankly.

"Use those little subtle Ziva tricks to convince me. It's mean and rather annoying."

Ziva gave him her back, unfussed.

"I wasn't trying to convince you. The last thing I need is a yelping puppy wrapped around my ankles."

"See? You're doing it again!" Tony protested, however leaving her definitely indifferent.

"Are you staying or coming, Tony?" she hissed, driven to exasperation. He held his gun up next to his face and lifted a brow.

"What do you think?"

She moved too quickly for him to waste precious seconds in further evaluations, so he cursed under his breath and cautiously followed her through the yard, taking a mental note to chew her out properly as soon as they would be done.

"Stay behind me." she muttered when they got a few metres from the container. Not even the lightest noise was audible, which could only bode nothing good.

"What did I tell you about our respective roles, sweetcheeks?" snapped Tony. "I am the man, you are the woman. _I_ protect _you_."

"Shush!" She presses her free hand onto his mouth and froze him with her look. There was some magic in her eyes that is just impossible to fight.

A clanging sound came from the inside of the container, and she stepped very carefully toward the entrance, not neglecting to keep an eye around. Tony followed suit, more for habit than else. He knew chivalry was bullshit when it came to certain things, and in this case he couldn't possibly deny Ziva was much more apt than him at leading operations.

Another metallic sound came to their ears, this time clearer and louder.

"He's trapped." Ziva murmured. "I'll cross to the other side and we'll break in together. He'll have no way out."

"I would like to remind you he has a machine-gun, sweetheart." He said with a not so convinced tone. "We make a move, he fires. We die, he runs."

"Give me a little credit, Tony, I know what I do."

She felt the warmth of his breath on the nape of her neck.

"Last time I indulged you I ended up tied to a chair and beaten by a not exactly gentle-mannered guy."

Ziva shut her eyes, inhaling to keep herself from yelling at him.

"I should have left you there." She huffed.

"Don't you even go there, Miss Manipulator. You thinged me into this."

She turned around with her brows furrowed.

"I… _What_?"

Tony sighed.

"Never mind."

"Okay," She positioned herself as close as possible to the half open door and took a deep breath. "I'll count to three, then we go."

Tony gulped, nodding.

"Roger."

"One… Two…" Ziva's fingers clutched at the gun, the barrel expertly pointed forward. "Three!"

They jumped in, back against back, hearts racing, but nothing happened. They looked around bewildered, only to see empty boxes and a couple of dead rats. Their man, however, seemed to have vanished.

"What the heck…"

Before Tony could complete the sentence, the light inside the container disappeared all of a sudden, and a loud slamming noise made them turn back to the doors, that shut heavily right under their noses.

Ziva groped beseechingly in that direction, her eyes not yet used to the sudden murkiness that had fallen upon them. She hit her wrists against the rusty metal surface and kicked it violently with a furious snarl.

"Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!"

Tony's face fell, shifting colours.

"Please, say it ain't so."

Ziva smacked another series of kicks against the unmoving door and cursed in Hebrew.

"It's locked." She declared defeatedly.

"Shit." Tony overrode the dead rats and went by her side, trying to peep through the thin line of light between the two shutters. "Told ya it was better to wait."

Ziva snorted, wrenching at the handle so brusquely that for a moment he thought she would actually break it.

"This is not the moment to spite me, Tony." She panted. "We are-"

"Please, don't say that."

"- Struck inside here."

"Thank you for making me feel better." He rolled his eyes, mopping some sweat off his forehead with the hem of his sleeve. "It's pretty hot in here, uh? Unlike the first time…"

"We're so in trouble…" Ziva ignored him completely. "We were not supposed to be here. When Gibbs finds out we disobeyed his orders-"

"We're dead."

Ziva brushed her hair back with both her hands and leaned back against one of the wooden boxes.

"Yeah."

"If we don't die before." He bent toward the thin yet solid wall and randomly tapped on it. "And this time, instead of risking to turn into human icicles, we'll likely end up steamed by the heat."

She got rid of her hat and shirt and tied her hair up in a loose bun.

"Optimism is your greatest trait, isn't it?" She replied ironically. Tony shrugged in mock modesty.

"Guess so…" He eyed her appreciatively, silently praising that heavenly white and transparent tank top. "You're not wearing a bra."

"As if it was big news to you." She glanced at him with a warning look. "Not that I want to cook your duck, but I'm not in the mood to be eye-undressed."

"_Goose_." He precised. She shrugged. "You know, I've always wished to try extreme danger sex."

"Oh, please," She clacked her tongue in disapproval. "We're caged in a bunker and you can only think about that."

"It's not like there's much to think about in here." He defended himself, then cast her an allusive grin. "It'd be the very last thing we do before dying… Wouldn't it be sweet?"

"It would be _sweaty_." She jumped sitting upon a closed box as a drop of sweat crept down her face. "It feels like burning in hell's flames in this place."

Tony dropped a quick look around, scratching the back of his head.

"Maybe you're right… There's not even room for sex."

"Oh, trust me," Ziva took her cell-phone from her pocket and flipped it open. No signal, and the battery wouldn't last much longer. "I've done it in much worse conditions." This time their hope to make it was – if possible – dangerously slimmer than the first time. "Not the greatest experiences of my life, though. Wrong men, I suppose."

Tony chuckled, intrigued by the peculiar anecdote. Despite the situation, he couldn't help feeling flirtatious around her. It was in his nature. Or perhaps it was in her nature to have people feeling like that.

"I'll take it as an invitation." He said audaciously, climbing up the box to sit by her.

"Hands off, Tony." She warned him, holding her forefinger up. "It's that period of the month, I'm irritable and mentally unstable. Do or say the wrong thing and I'll make you sexually neutral."

"Threatens fuel my viciousness, so you'd better cut it before I jump you." He jokingly placed a finger under her chin. "Unless it's precisely your intention."

"Oh, god, kill me now, please!" She repeatedly hit her forehead against his shoulder, a hidden smile on her lips that Tony couldn't notice.

"Look, I'm as anxious as you and maybe even more frustrated." He said apologetically. "Bear with me, it's not all my fault."

Ziva pulled up, a disbelieving expression painted on her sweaty face.

"And would it be _my_ fault, then?"

Tony put on an innocent face and played numb.

"It's not me the temptingly hot looking one here… Well, I am, too, but-"

With a dashing movement she gripped his throat and faced him closely, conveying him how particularly dangerous she was today.

"Why don't you just shut up while I try to think of a way to get us out of here?" she suggested, her voice throaty and low, much to his pleasure. The look he gave her was a mixture of sensuality and mischief. Ziva didn't know how they could be so childishly tantalizing to each other in a situation like that.

"Why don't you shut me up yourself?" he cheekily suggested. Ziva looked him square in the eye and raised an eyebrow. She needed to think, and she obviously wouldn't be able to do that with Tony verbally molesting her. If that was the price for some silence, then she was willing to pay it. After all, they had done it before.

"Fine."

She leaned forward and her lips came into brief contact with his. Not in a real kiss, just in the angle of his mouth, and she was sure he would accuse her of cheating, but she wasn't going to give him that kind of satisfaction.

When she pulled away, Tony was staring at her, seemingly at a loss for words. It had been a joke, he hadn't believed she would do it for real.

"You really did that." He faltered, brushing the spot where she had kissed him with his fingers. Ziva didn't squabble at all.

"So it seems." He hated her when she used that couldn't-care-less tone. "Will you kindly shut up, now?"

His dazed expression wouldn't fade. The gesture itself hadn't been so shocking, after all, but the nonchalance she had put in it had been rather disorienting. She had done it just like it was something she did every day, like she knew exactly how to do it to have him like it.

"Ziva you… Kissed me."

She clenched her fists, fuming. Another five minutes with him, and one of then would be dead.

"Holy shit, Tony, I need to concentrate! Just shut that damn mouth, would you?"

He remained silent for a short while, listening to the faint noises and sounds coming from the outside and feeling the heat steadily increasing. They were locked into a heating metal prison under the August sun. How long would it take for them to reach their endurance limit?

"I get overtalkative when I am shocked by unexpected events." He began again after the pause, but Ziva was not very inclined toward paying attention to him.

"I get overharmful when I am bothered by overtalkative people." She said tiredly, her head resting back on the side of another box. A couple of drops of sweat crawled down her neck and along her chest, dying in the soft line between her breasts.

Mirroring her position, Tony loosened the collar of his shirt and let his eyes flutter closed.

"I'll shut up."

"Great." Moaned Ziva contentedly, and rolled her head to one side.

She had to come up with something to let Gibbs localize their position. The only matter was that they were about three sections away from where they were supposed to be, where their car was. Translated into numbers that meant about half a mile, giving or taking a few feet.

She had to find a way out, and quickly, because Tony wasn't being much cooperative and soon the sun would reach the zenith, and she didn't want to be in their own shoes when that would happen.

* * *

TBC... 


	2. Boxed In, Round Two

"Crap!"

Just back from his updating course for rookies, McGee walked into Abby's lab, welcomed by her loud imprecations. He found her arguing with her computer with a scary light in her eyes.

"Abbs?"

As soon as she saw him, Abby swivelled toward him, looking downcast and alarmed.

"Timmy!" She seized him by the jacket and shook him. "Gibbs is going to kill me!" she mewled. "I'm finished, over, condemned, dead and buried, fucked up…"

He didn't know what was going on, but he had the feeling it was anything but good. Abby in panic was never a good sign.

"Abbs, what did I miss?" he asked, not so sure he did want to know.

She nibbled at her lip, a guilty look on her face, tapping her fists together. Gibbs would be furious, he would ask for her head on a stake.

"I lost them." She blubbered, jumping hysterically on her spot, eyes squeezed. "I swore Gibbs this time it wouldn't happen, and I lost them!"

McGee did his best to calm her down. He grabbed her arms and made her sit back on the desk, looking her in the eye.

"Take a deep breath and tell me what on earth is going on."

Abby breathed in and stayed motionless for a moment, then jumped up again and started pacing the room, gesturing frenetically.

"Gibbs sent Tony and Ziva to the shipyard to investigate a small cell of Iraquen terrorists who have been importing weapons for over two years…" She met McGee's realization look. "I've still got the car, but their cell phones signals have vanished."

McGee's mouth stuttered as he tried to say something comforting.

"I uh… Don't think they…" She gave him a hopeful gaze. "I'm sure it's not what we think…"

"So you think it's _that_ too!" she cried.

"No!" he said quickly. "They just might be… Well… You know them, I bet they are… Er…"

Abby grabbed his head between her hands and pulled him face to face to her.

"Timothy, observe these beautiful blue eyes very carefully," she said theatrically. "Because if we don't find them before Gibbs is back from Madam Director, it's your last chance to see them."

McGee laughed nervously, in a very lame attempt to defuse the situation.

"Don't worry, Abbs. I'm sure they're on their way back by now."

---

"Do you think there's a chance you'll succumb to my charm by the end of this arousing experience? Or by our death, at least…"

Ziva was sick and tired – in the most literal sense possible – of being there, constantly nagged by Tony's persistent rambling. What was worse, they had been there for scarcely an hour.

"Tony!" she moaned, barely raising her voice. She felt too hot and tired to even bother to cool him down.

He dabbed his shirt all over his face and neck, panting.

"Okay, okay." He dropped the damp shirt on the box on his left. "Silent as a tomb… Oh, wrong metaphor, maybe?"

Ziva gloomily glanced at him.

"Not funny."

"It wasn't meant to be funny." He replied, resting a hand on his bare chest. He turned his head toward her. "I was just trying to point out the depth of my silence."

"Someone once said: 'For a real man there is no try. There is only do'."

Tony let out a short, sceptical laugh.

"Someone who?"

Ziva stirred her arms above her head. A growing craving for water was seriously putting her stoic resistance to the test and she didn't have any more strength to dismiss his questions.

"Yoel Heber." She answered flatly.

"And who is Yoel Heber?"

"A guy I knew."

Tony put on a sultry chuckle at once.

"In the biblical sense of the term?"

"In every possible sense of the term." She shifted position and a couple of locks slipped from the bun behind her head, falling at the sides of her sticky face. "But he couldn't say the same about me."

Tony scrutinised her. He had never heard her say anything good about any man of her past she had spoken of, so far. He asked himself if it was a coincidence, or if it had been her choice to not love any of them.

Now that he thought about it, the only person she had really had a good word for was her departed sister.

"As if somebody could." He couldn't say they were best pals, but he hoped she had some more consideration for him than for Yoel.

Ziva addressed him a poignant look, surprised to hear that vague shade of regret.

"A person who knows you, owns you." She explained mildly, conceding him a half smile. "I don't like to have leashes around my throat."

Tony knew very well what she was talking about. She was a wild spirit, and apparently allergic to any kind of concrete boundary. That was definitely something he would like to change.

"So you're going to run from everyone like a scared rabbit?" he asked her. "Until you won't be tired and will have left everybody behind?"

Ziva shook her head. She didn't expect him to understand, especially since he ignored her reasons, and yet she was thankful, somehow, that he was proving so caring to her.

"It's not what I said."

"But it's what you meant."

She closed her eyes, settling her head on his right shoulder. The smell of his skin reminded her of a lot of things, so many different feelings. He still needed a deodorant, but it would be insensitive of her to remark it now.

"What do you care about what I meant or not?" she said disimpassionately. "You have your life, I have mine. Don't meddle when you're not invited."

"Are you kidding me?" Tony's eyes were wide in daze. "Ziva, you're a part of my life, I do meddle whenever I want to, because sometimes it seems just like you don't care about staying alive."

Ziva winced lightly, feeling he had scored. She wasn't, in fact, very worried about trivial things such as life and death, and maybe that was why she was so good in her job.

"In fact I don't." she admitted candidly. "Believe me, years and years in Mossad have thought me not to be attached to anything you could lose. Life is among such things."

"And your own sister as well."

He looked down at her and skimmed the top of her head with his chin. She didn't move, but her eyes were open again.

"What do you know about my sister?" the question itself didn't sound uneasy, but she knew he would note her skilfully masked surprise.

"Not much, actually." He took his left arm under his head. His other hand was blocked by Ziva's body, and, to be completely honest, he didn't feel like moving it any soon. "Tali David, sixteen years old… Pretty young to deserve to die." He made a brief pause, shooting a rapid glance at her. "Especially if she resembled you."

Painful memories arose among Ziva's thoughts, moments she had hoped she would never relive. She found herself swallowing back a sore lump in her throat.

"Tali was a kid." She told him, her voice trembling imperceptibly. "She was not like me. I've never given a damn about tomorrow, but she was so… Lively." Tony listened religiously to that profound and rare moment of confidence. There was some remote melancholy in her voice that had him completely bewitched. "My father took her death very personally. He told me that tragedies like that reminded us the reason why we were fighting."

He felt for her, he sincerely did. In spite of her tough disguise, he knew she must have suffered a lot during her life. He could see it in her eyes, even when she would flash her brightest smile. She was physically marked by a sorrow that sometimes nearly scared him.

He could picture her, a girl in a world of men, struggling to prove herself worth her father's trust, his love.

Young Ziva, prideful Ziva, stubborn Ziva, courageous Ziva. Beautiful, beautiful Ziva.

God knew what she must have had to bear.

"So you devoted your life to Mossad to revenge your little sister?"

She stared down, smiling bitterly.

"No." she shook her head, pursing her lips. "I devoted my life to Mossad because I should have foreseen the intentions of those terrorists. It was my job to know, I should have been able to catch them in time." A feeble jittery laugh escaped from her. "Guilt bites, you know."

"I didn't know you had a conscience." He observed, teasing her intentionally. Ziva laughed again, this time more lightheartedly.

"You don't know a lot of things. This does not make them inexistent."

"What I meant is-"

"I know what you meant." She cut in. Her mouth curled sourly. "A cold hearted bitch who goes around killing and torturing people is not supposed to have feelings." She barely tilted her head in his direction. "Which is fine to me, because mine are safely buried somewhere in my past."

She felt Tony's fingers brush hesitantly against her back for the fraction of a second. She looked at him and he immediately repositioned his hand on the surface of the box, hanging his head. When he lifted it again he was rather serious.

"Do you ever wish to retrieve them?" he asked her gently "To let yourself be alive again?"

Ziva felt her whole body getting soaked minute by minute. Her face was felt hot and moist, and her sense of exhaustion was growing.

"If I'm alive, I can be killed." She soughed, breathing hardly.

"This is attachment to life, in my humble opinion."

"Call it whatever you want to. I've been through hells the most well-trained and shrewd men haven't survived, and I'm still standing here."

"Why to survive if you're not alive?"

Ziva did not respond. She closed her eyes and just resettled her face against his nude shoulder. Tony did the same upon her head. The increasing heat was driving them to the point when even talking was difficult.

"You blame me for living the day, but I'm not so different from you." He whispered, licking his dry lips. "I taste bits of everything and push them away before they get me addicted. You close your doors before anyone can come in, I let everyone linger in the hall, but in the end neither of us lets anything in. You and I are the same, even if in different ways."

Her eyes didn't open, but her heart had a small jump inside her chest.

"Are you saying you understand?"

"I'm saying we're together in this endless loneliness."

She endeavoured a giggle, but soon regretted it as a nasty headache awakened in her.

"Now, isn't that poetic of you?"

"I can be serious at times, you know."

"Yeah, when you talk about cars and steaks."

"And Magnum PI." He added.

"As serious as a walking Hawaiian shirt with big moustache can be."

"I'll pretend I didn't hear that."

"And I'll pretend you didn't say I'm like you."

In the silence that followed, he could hear her breath become more and more difficult. He knew she was starting feeling ill – heck, he was, too – but, hard as it was, there was nothing he could do about it, and it stung. Hadn't he told her more than once that he was the one who should protect her?

"Magnum PI was a great show, by the way." He said, attempting to distract her, and, in fact, Ziva grinned.

"You were old enough to appreciate it. At that time I must have been still in kindergarten."

"Kindergarten? I thought you were already a licensed killer at that time." She fell mute, stiffening. Tony realised he had been inappropriate. "Sorry."

Ziva lifted her hand and laid it down on his arm. She felt sick, and she was sure she had never craved anything as she was now craving water.

"Don't apologise." She told him. "It's a sign of-"

"Weakness. I know."

She nodded in approval.

"Gibbs docet."

Tony wrinkled his nose, confused.

"I beg your pardon?"

"It's Latin, Tony." She mumbled patiently, unable to stifle a little yawn. She wanted to sleep, she _needed_ to sleep, but it wouldn't be a good idea, given her physical conditions. "It means 'Gibbs teaches'."

"Indeed he does." Tony agreed.

He didn't feel exactly in shape himself. The burning feeling he had all over his body was driving him crazy, and the humidity in the air made it practically impossible to breathe. Besides, the two rats lying not far from them were starting to smell of decomposition. They needed to get rid of them quickly, or they would risk to catch some disease.

"Ziva?"

"Mmmh?"

"They'll find us in time, won't they?"

The only answer that came to him was the droning, comforting sound of her snoring. While a tiny smile tugged at one corner of his mouth, Tony, lulled by the scent of her hair, slowly drifted into a restless sleep.

---

"You have to learn to deal with the press, Jethro." Said director Shepard imperiously. "Journalists are very good at putting into your mouth things you'd never say."

Gibbs snickered quietly, hands tucked into his pockets. It was not the first preach her got from her about his lack of diplomacy with the medias, and it certainly wouldn't be the last.

"Next time you are interviewed," Jenny continued, flashing him a severe glare "Even if it's just one single question, _please_, leave it up to McGee to answer."

He put on a quizzical expression.

"Why McGee?"

"Because DiNozzo is a reckless exhibitionist and Ziva would be ruder than you." She sighed. "If it's even possible."

He sneered at her indignation and took an insolent sip from his coffee. He would have thought she was feigning it, once, but she had changed since Paris days, and a lot.

"Why should I play the good boy?" he asked with a wink. "That would ruin all the fun you ensue from criticising everything I do."

She was about to reply, when the red button of her telephone started to flicker. Jen took it to her ear and answered privately.

"Yes?" Gibbs heard the disturbed sound of her secretary's voice. "Of course, let her in."

She lay the phone in the same moment the door opened. A tall, slender woman walked in confidently, her heels ticking onto the floor at every step.

Gibbs didn't need to read the badge pinned to the jacket of her dark blue suit to know who she was. He knew those vertiginous legs, that long raven black hair. He knew the brightness of those ice blue eyes, and better than anything else he knew the smirk those red flashy lips bore.

It had been years since they had last met, he had almost forgotten of her existence – _almost_ – and his jaw nearly dropped in finding her materialised out of thin air right in front of him, steelier and prettier than ever.

"Evelyn?"

The young woman smiled politely, uncovering a set of pearl white teeth. As he well remembered, the front ones were still slightly overlapped, and yet deliciously arousing.

"_Ciao_ Jethro."

* * *

TBC... 


	3. The Great Exception

It took me a while to write this and still I'm not very satisfied with how it turned out, but whatever, I'll leave it up to you to judge. Reviews are much appreciated and fuel my inspiration, so if you want to drop your opinion about what you read, I'll be glad and happy, and this will surely make me write with even further pleasure. ; )

Enjoy!

* * *

"Agents DiNozzo and David have left their car in the zone my undercover agents are keeping an eye on. You can imagine my reaction when I heard Tony's name and the word 'disappeared' in the same sentence."

Gibbs observed Evelyn out of the corner of his eye, heading with her toward the elevator. The conversation with Jenny had been brief and quite painless, even if he had the impression the Director had sensed something about him and the other woman. How long had it been? Six years? Seven? Eight? He couldn't remember. He had put too much energy in removing every remnant of her from his memory to be able to say with precision when they had first met and last seen each other.

But this was not important, now. Tony and Ziva were officially missing, presumably within the area of sector C of the shipyard where they were investigating. He only hoped the story wasn't repeating itself.

"How did you end up where you are from the NCIS?" Gibbs asked, ignoring her speech, as the elevator doors slid closed in front of them.

Evelyn kept looking straight in front of her, impassive. Nothing in her appeared to have changed. Her hair was longer and her body less curvy, and she would have never worn a skirt, once, but her almond-shaped eyes and ever-pouting lips were still the same, as well as her right cheekbone still bore that thin crescent-moon-like scar. When their eyes crossed, he knew she was thinking the same things about him.

Evelyn cleared her throat.

"I worked for FBI for a couple of years before accepting a place as an ATF undercover agent." She explained. "But after I got a couple of bullets into my stomach and lost our child, my husband begged me to switch to something more… Sedentary."

Gibbs chocked in his coffee. He reached out and pressed the 'stop' button.

"Your _husband_?"

"I got married. Twice." She said nonchalantly, and started the elevator again. "I last divorced three months ago."

A small grin curled his lips. He couldn't deny he was pleased to see he was not the only one who had serious issues in staying married for longer than a few months.

"I would have never thought to see you as a Homeland Security vice-director." He commented. She let out a graceful laugh.

"Because I'm a former spy?"

"Because you're not the kind of woman who sits back and watches as others do all the work." He sent her a significant look, smirking. "But I have to concede you've always had the numbers to be a leader."

Of course she was cut out to be a boss. After all, she had been a rather difficult subordinate to handle. Or better, _insubordinate_.

"Speaking of leadership," she turned to him sternly. "You still have to explain why _your_ guys were in _my_ jurisdiction."

Gibbs pushed 'stop', clutching at his half empty coffee.

"You're really enjoying to stand above me in power, aren't you?"

Evelyn smirked.

"Quite, indeed."

Young as she was, she surely had a talent in acting bossy and self-confident. Figures, she had been like that ever since her very first day on the job.

"In fact I vividly recall you've always been the control liking type." He teased. Evelyn didn't react at his intentional provocation, but he could see she was keeping herself from letting her lips curl.

"It's always been our problem." She said. "We both seek for submission in a partner, and neither of us would ever acquiesce."

He laughed deep in her chest, his shoulders moving in synchrony.

"Is this why you left?"

"No, Jethro." Evelyn shifted from foot to foot, eyes still fixed on an indefinite spot in front of her, her sweet and yet detached voice resonating within the four walls of the elevator. "I left because there's no room for two queen bees in the same hive."

She reached out and started the elevator again, then folded her arms across her chest. Translated into current English, that meant that the little parenthesis was over.

Gibbs faced down, helpless. It would be a long, tough day.

-------

Abby was still struggling to individuate Tony and Ziva, her farting hippo squashed onto her chest. McGee was beside her, doing his best to give a hand, but they were both aware there was very little they could do if their cell-phones were off or not catching any signal. In fact, they had been there for half an hour and had got to no point yet.

"I had always hoped I would have died a spectacular death." Whined a fidgety Abby, causing McGee to furrow his brows questioningly. "I'd figured an apocalyptic car crash down a bridge, or… I dunno, sacrificing my life to save someone else from a truculent death… Dying by Gibbs's fury was not darn contemplated."

McGee opted not to reply. When Abby had her moments of deliriousness it was better to let it wear off without intruding.

In that moment the doors of the lab swooshed open, and the both of them jumped up, startled.

"I swear it was McGee's fault!" Abby claimed at once as she recognised Gibbs's steps, cringing on her spot. "I wanted to tell you, but-"

"Explanations later, Abby."

They turned and found Gibbs with a woman McGee didn't know. By her totally astonished expression, however, it seemed like Abby did, and Gibbs, too.

"Lyn?" Abby exclaimed bubbling.

"Abigail Sciuto!" The woman cooed in delight, spreading her arms to hug her. "Oh my god, look at yourself! My little Abbsy has grown up!"

McGee witnessed to that peculiar event in daze. He had no clue of who that charming stranger was, but he was the only one showing signs of uneasiness. He stood awkwardly in the middle of the room, intercepting Gibbs's stern look.

"Evelyn," he interrupted bluntly, pulling the two girls apart. "Let's put off the ceremonies, shall we? We got to find those two before my patience runs out." He grabbed McGee by an arm and hastily made introductions. "McGee, this is Special Agent Evelyn Della Torre, Homeland Security. Evelyn, Special Agent Timothy McGee."

The two shook hands, then Gibbs departed them and pushed McGee back in front of Abby's monitor.

"You two go on here." Gibbs ordered brusquely. "We'll talk about the consequences of not having informed me of this when we're sure Tony and Ziva are safe and unharmed. You" he severely pointed his finger to Evelyn. "Have a lot to tell me."

-------

"I told you about Heber." Whispered Ziva. "Tell me something about your dark past. Something nobody knows."

Tony crossed his hands behind his head wistfully. He had awoken half an hour ago to find Ziva placidly asleep on his lap, lying on her side, and since she had woken up she hadn't moved yet. All in all, he couldn't say he was displeased of the situation.

"I slept with my Maths teacher when I was eighteen." He declared.

"Why doesn't this surprise me?" snickered Ziva.

"She was fifty six and weighted two hundred pounds."

A pause of soundlessness followed.

"Okay, so maybe I didn't really want to know." she said.

"It was my biggest sacrifice ever." Tony went on. "But you should have seen how better my marks became."

Ziva was surprised that after three hours in there he still had the strength to be humorous, but she decided she would keep his pace, as long as she could, since the burning feeling on her face and whole body did not seem to be going to leave her any soon.

She brought up her Ziva tongue-in-cheek banter.

"Did you sleep with Gibbs to get to work with him, too?"

"That was low."

She attempted a giggle, but it ended up into a cough. Tony's heart shrank. He would have never thought one day he would see Ziva so debilitated, he could hardly recognise her. They were getting dehydrated and the hottest hours of the day were literally cooking them. How longer would they be able to resist?

"You think?" She quipped, forcing herself to keep the atmosphere cheery.

"I might as well ask if you slept with Shepard to get to work with us." He dared.

Toying with the folds of his jeans, Ziva smiled mischievously.

"Maybe I did."

"Did you?" His sudden enthralment was nearly comical.

"I'll leave you the benefit of the doubt."

"How very diplomatic of you." He snorted, disappointed. "Planning on becoming our next director, David?"

Ziva rolled on her back, gazing directly up at him, who looked like a huge oiled sausage. Or maybe it was just her hunger to make him look so appetising.

"Who knows." She brushed the thought of taking a bite from him off her mind. "I might consider the option just to have the pleasure to see you crawling at my feet."

"Well well, seems like I'm right in the middle of your wildest fantasies."

"You're trying to change the subject."

"Wha-? No, I'm not."

"Eat vegetables and fear no creditor, rather than eat duck and hide." She cited, thickening her accent. Tony stared down at her with a question mark designed upon his face.

"What?"

"Hebrew saying." She told him.

"I kinda figured that on my own, thanks." He pinched at her nose, and she laughed gently. "It's always Hebrew stuff when I don't get a damn thing about it."

"In short words, it means 'Never do, say, or ask more than strictly necessary, if you don't want to pay for it'."

Tony nodded vehemently.

"Smart folks you Israelis."

"Maybe it's just Americans who are stupid." She retorted, and he wasn't sure she was joking.

"Hey, my heritage is Italian one hundred percent, so do not even look at me." he stated defensively.

Ziva lifted a brow sceptically, in the best playful attitude she could get.

"Blood will spill… Eventually."

"Blood will _out_, Ziva." He corrected. "And I'd like it to stay into my veins in the process."

"I want to get out of here…" She wiped some sweat off her forehead with his shirt, then let it fall haphazardly to the ground. "I'm unbearably hot."

Tony grinned down defiantly.

"Glad to hear you noticed, too."

Ziva let out a jaded grunt.

"Drop these unhappy advances and let me be, yes?"

Tony smiled fondly when he was sure her eyes were safely closed. She had never looked so unhealthy before. Actually, he had started to think she was immune from any kind of physical illness, but now, seeing her so weak and tired, he knew she was as human as anybody else. Right here and right now, for the first time Tony saw her for what she was: a creature halfway between a girl and a woman, a killer and a victim, a demon and an angel. Now she wasn't speaking anymore, he could hear her inner voice telling all her secrets, revealing all her hidden scars.

Tony was surprised – and also a bit scared – to realise that, even if she was the one in need, he was the one who would have been lost without her.

He moved a hand to her forehead and stroked it delicately with his thumb.

"Just hold on, baby," he muttered, so low that she couldn't hear him. "We'll be out of here soon."

By the time his last word had been pronounced, something broke abruptly into the box, smashing against the iron walls with a deafening creaking sound. All Tony registered, though, was Ziva's ear-piercing cry of pain.

-------

McGee watched Gibbs walk away with Special Agent Della Torre, his jaw permanently dropped. He was used to see women come and go from the boss's life, but there was something in her that was different. They way not only Gibbs, but Abby too, acted around her was way too informal, and her familiarity with the lab had dismayed him a bit, also.

"Who's that woman?" he asked when his mental faculties turned back on. Abby trotted by his side with a puppy face, holding Sam – as she had named her hippo in joint decision with Tim – tight to her, his huge nose settled under her chin.

"She was in the team before Kate arrived." She explained, in a way that in McGee's opinion could only be defined as solemn. "She and Gibbs were… Well, they were pretty-"

He furrowed his brow and eyed her suspiciously.

"Intimate?"

Abby inclined her head, lips pressed together as she shook her pigtails no, apparently looking for a more appropriate term.

"Passionate." She decided in the end. "Yes, we could say they were passionate. Passionate as in 'bed passionate'."

"Oh."

McGee's cheeks turned a bright shade of pink as unwanted images of Gibbs and Special Agent Della Torre rose in his mind.

"She and I used to be very close, too. Believe it or not, she hasn't always been a sex kitten. She was the cutest McGeek on earth, when she arrived here." Abby recalled with a dreamy expression. "She was a bit like you."

"A bit like me?" McGee didn't know whether to be mad or flattered for the comparison.

Abby shrugged.

"Tony, Ducky and I used to call her The Great Exception."

"Why is that?"

"Didn't you see that shiny cascade of raven black hair?" Abby said, pulling one of her own pigtails. Realisation instantly hit McGee's brain.

"Gibbs likes redheads."

"Yep." Abby nodded. "She's the first non-redheaded woman we've seen him with." She drew him closer to whisper in his ear. "And the last, also."

McGee was honestly surprised. He had always believed Gibbs had some mild case of OCD for what concerted certain things, among which were coffee, his boats and a fetish for redheads. He would have never thought that a subject like him would ever detour from his habits, and so drastically. Other than that, Special Agent Della Torre was a girl, rather than a woman, when she had worked in his team, and McGee knew Gibbs didn't like green fruits, however juicy and succulent they might look.

"She must have been pretty young at that time…" he mused.

"Twenty eight. And that was five years ago."

"Her features look European."

"Correct." Abby patted his shoulder and squeezed a fart out of Sam, then went back to her computer. "Her family background is Italian, Norwegian and Irish. Tony found it very attractive."

McGee turned around, sensing some hesitation in her tone.

"Tony?"

Abby bit her tongue. If Gibbs would ever happen to find out she had told McGee something like that, she would be dead. Luckily – or maybe better _unluckily_ – there was already a sentence to death above her head for having kept from him Tony and Ziva's disappearance, so why to bother?

"They had an affair in between her break up with Gibbs and her resignation." She told him surreptitiously "Tony doesn't like to talk about it, so don't even think about asking him."

Trying to imagine what would happen if any of the three mentioned people would do if he would dare ask a half question, McGee shuddered and preferred to forget about it.

"I wasn't going to." He stated, and regained his place next to Abby to start working again. He had an unpleasant sensation.

Tony and Ziva had been there before, and he had never been so worried so far, but this time it was different. for some reason, this time he felt like something really bad was going to happen - if it hadn't, already.

* * *

TBC... 


	4. One Step Closer

Ziva was seeing red. She had been overthrown to the ground by something hard and sharp that had collided with her and had hit her head in the fall. The iron taste she had in her mouth made her understand that the blinding pain she felt in her side was not just due to a simple bruise. For long moments she had no perception of her whole body and lay motionless on the ground, hearing muffled agitated voices coming from an imprecise source. When her senses finally returned, she felt like she had needles stabbed all over her members.

"Ziva!"

She squinted at Tony, whose unfocused face was floating above her in the middle of a mysterious light. She reached out to touch him, to make sure she wasn't being delusional. When she raised her hand she found it covered in blood. Something hit the container with loud repeated strokes, crashing against it with violence, opening small holes all over the metallic wall.

"Calm, just stay calm," Tony was telling her, sounding anything but calm himself. "Do not move." As her eyesight cleared out, she saw him studying intently the right side of her torso, eerie disconcert on his face. She moved her hand gropingly, until she met the sharp surface of one of the metal sheets of the walls. It was soaked with a thick substance – likely blood, _her_ blood – and apparently embedded in her side, which explained the bleeding and also the ache.

She cursed mentally, still not very aware of the current situation.

"What happened?" she asked. Whatever had crashed into the box – some kind of loader, according to the little she could see – was now reversing. By Tony's stuttering reaction, she deduced he had no good answer to her question. In the meantime, the crashes went by.

"I think we're in trouble." He said, casting spooky glances at something. With a big endeavour, Ziva turned in that direction and felt welcome fresh air blowing on her face.

Although momentarily hurt by the strong sunlight, she was soon able to individuate the contours of the considerably large crack that had been opened. Unknown hostile faces were pointing unidentified firearms at the two of them.

"_Harah_!"

-------

In the MTAC, Gibbs and Evelyn were animatedly discussing. He hadn't had a tête-à-tête with her in years, and now he remembered why he hadn't missed it.

Evelyn was pacing back and forth in front of the plasma, decrypting codes and zooming videos as though she had been doing it for her whole life. He could hardly believe she was the same woman he had watched walk away five years ago.

She had changed since then, she wasn't like him anymore.

"This satellite scans the area where Tony and Officer David went missing for half an hour every two hours." She indicated the screen with the remote control she was holding. Tony and Ziva's car was parking next to a small building. "At ten thirty they left the car and inspected the yard. At ten to eleven" She fast forwarded until Tony and Ziva jumped behind a container and opened fire against a mysterious man who had his face covered. "There was a shootout. Two pistols can do very little against a machine gun, unless the machine gun is in inexpert hands, and the pistol in professionalists' hands – which, luckily, was our case."

Gibbs studied the video carefully, until it turned black and Evelyn stopped it.

"So that was the first thirty minutes we have." He assumed. She nodded. "What happens next?"

"We lose them." She declared flatly, pushing 'play'. On the screen an image of a seriously damaged container appeared. A considerably big loader was crashing insistently onto one of the sides, creating a hole among lethal-looking iron sheets.

"But I have reason to think that this has to do with them." Evelyn said. Gibbs frowned, narrowing his eyes to focalise the picture.

"Do you think my people were locked in that thing?"

Evelyn crossed her arms and stopped the image.

"My guess is that they were imprisoned in that container by a rookie. Namely, the same rookie who decoyed them there."

"And why would he do such thing?" he questioned, for the mere pleasure to make her feel under test anew after a long time.

Evelyn accepted the provocation very elegantly. She approached him with a knowing half smirk and regarded him sassily.

"Rookies are unadvised and imprudent, and very eager to make a good impression on the boss." She addressed him an audacious wink that he found somewhat inappropriate, and yet he couldn't help enjoying it. She receded next to the plasma and resumed her documentation. "Cops can be very tasty quarry. I suppose locking them in was a temporary settlement. And that is why" she zoomed on the loader. "They came back."

Well-impressed, but still suspicious, Gibbs took a seat on one of the armchairs and leant his elbows on his knees musingly, staring at the blurry face of the man driving the loader. There was something that didn't convince him.

"What can you tell me of him?" He hinted at John Doe.

With an expert movement, Evelyn fixed the resolution, and it became clear. He had a very noticeable scar crossing his face from side to side.

"He's been ID-ed." She said, and opened a small window in one corner of the screen. The man's face appeared in another picture, sided by a long list of notes. "Qasim Houssam, thirty, Arabian. Family background unknown, education unknown, last address unknown, current job unknown, official documents unavailable."

"This is a little too much secrecy for a mere smuggler." He snorted. "This thing stinks."

Evelyn didn't move a muscle.

"One sure thing is that there was no dangerous or valuable material in that box, otherwise they wouldn't have run the risk to damage it." she pointed out, standing starched and stiff. Gibbs, however, wouldn't let her skip the question so easily.

"But why to use such an unhandy method to reopen it if it was one of them to lock it?"

Evelyn stood motionless in front of the screen, giving hi her back. For a brief instant he thought he'd caught her unprepared, but it didn't last enough to let him chuckle in satisfaction.

"Smugglers tend to be as violent as possible when it comes to risking their goods." She responded, and even if he couldn't see her face, he knew she wore that chuckle she didn't leave him the chance to wear. Nevertheless he felt there was something she was omitting. "They're just mules, rarely the nucleus of the organisation is among them. If something goes wrong, there's their life at stake. I believe they wanted to frighten them, but not kill them."

"What makes you think this?" Gibbs inquired.

Evelyn turned to him with a bold yet guilty face. He understood she was about to say something that would drive him mad.

"I've sent a couple of my people to check the zone." She revealed. He felt a well known hot feeling in his ears. "They found a pool of blood." Gibbs held his breath unconsciously. "But it was not enough to come from a mortal wound."

Gibbs jumped up like a rampaging storm, louringly planting himself in front of her.

"I respect you, both as a leader and a woman, Evelyn." He hissed, towering only millimetres from her nose. "But dare you override me again, and I swear – _I swear_ – that it's the last thing you do as a vice-director."

She didn't squabble, but there was a light tremble to her voice when she replied.

"Deal."

Content with the clarification, Gibbs straightened up rigidly.

"Blood sample?"

Evelyn put on a mischievous grin and turned the video off.

"A dear friend of mine is analysing it right now. Twenty minutes and we'll know who was injured."

An unexpected shiver crossed his spine at the thought Tony or Ziva may have lost that blood.

"What did I just say about overriding me, Eve?" he barked, but she didn't drop her smirk.

"Abby, Jethro." She elaborated. "And while you were whining with Director Shepard about my spiny presence here, I had Special Agent McGee do some research to see if we can uncover something more about Houssam." She shot him a challenging glance. "At the moment, it's all we have."

Smirking back, he jiggled his head in amusement. Maybe he should reconsider his prior observation. She hadn't changed that much, after all.

-------

Ziva couldn't see anything but thick impenetrable darkness, cuffed by a hand to something very solid and firm. She was lying on a wet stony floor, barely conscious, struggling with an overwhelming feeling of dizziness in her aching head. A damp and surprisingly chill breeze blew in from an indiscernible point. It felt beautifully fresh on her burning face. Her mouth was dry and tasted acidly. She was thirsty.

With last bit of strength she still had, she took a hand to her side, coming into contact with the soaked fabric of her tank top. She lifted it, and her fingertips skimmed what felt like stitches.

Ziva's rationality staggered. Expert hands had sewed a deep cut that otherwise would have bled her to death, but she had been left in a cold dirty place. She could smell chloroform on her own skin.

Little by little she distinguished a familiar droning sound coming from somewhere not very far from where she lay.

"Tony?"

She called him a couple of times, attempting to awake him, but her eyelids were getting heavier and heavier, and her willpower was giving in to the sleepiness.

"Tony…" she murmured one last time, then her head fell loosely to one side and her thoughts melted into peaceful blankness.

-------

"I hate long waitings."

"Me too, Abbs."

Abby and McGee were sitting side by side in front of the wide screen as the blood sample was being tested for DNA. On one of the smaller screens, in the meantime, Qasim Houssam's name and picture were being subjected to a detailed research.

McGee laid his hand on Abby's, squeezing it for comfort. Arms clutched around Sam, she gave him a tiny smile in return.

"You don't think we're too late, do you?"

He made to reply, but she began again.

"Because, you know, I never told Tony how I hated that purple tie he wore at my birthday party… Oh, and Ziva! Once I told her she was a kinky bitch, but I never got to tell her-"

"She knows you didn't mean it." he said gently, but Abby scowled.

"No, I did mean it." She rested her head on his shoulder, sighing dramatically. "But in a good way. I love kinky bitches… I've been told I am too. Obviously I'm a _gother_ version, but this makes us sisters someway, you know…" she sighed again with a tragic expression. "I don't want to lose my sister, Timmy!"

McGee couldn't completely smother a laugh raising from his chest. In fact the whole building seemed sadly silent without Tony and Ziva's banter, or Abby and Ziva's little quarrels. He missed them, but it wasn't going to last much longer. McGee swore to himself they would find them very soon.

"Abbs?" A prolonged fart from Sam came in response. "I miss Tony's harassment."

Abby regarded him oozing fondness and threw her arms around his neck.

"Aw, McGee, isn't that the cutest thing you've ever said?"

"I thought it was when I told you how much I liked to sleep in your coffin…"

"Missing Tony comes second." She said. McGee couldn't see her smirking. "And you're just so so so sweet."

He hugged her back, blushing slightly. He and Abby hadn't had such an intimate moment in ages, and he couldn't deny he'd missed it. Abby ruffled his hair, and in that very moment someone walked in.

"Done with the slushiness, you two?" Gibbs's voice thundered in the room, but Abby didn't remove her arm from McGee's neck. To the contrary, she reached out for Gibbs and pulled him into a massive hug.

"We all need love in this moment." She said tenderly, nearly chocking them both.

Gibbs indulged her for a moment, patting her back reassuringly, then pulled away, looking tired and very nervy.

"Now the case, please."

Leaving Abby at her computer, McGee stood on his feet and walked Gibbs to one of the screens. He started typing on a keyboard.

"It was hard to find something about this guy, he seems to be some kind of ghost… But that peculiar scar was helpful." He said, as their suspect appeared, portrayed by a surveillance camera with a smartly-dressed dark-haired woman with shades and another couple of suspicious guys. "I've had to promise to take one of the most annoying women of this planet out for dinner in order to get this, boss, so I hope it'll be useful and-"

"Mc-Gee."

"Yes, boss." He cleared his throat awkwardly and enlarged the image. "This is Houssam two months ago, receiving weapons from a courier, in DC."

Gibbs stepped closer to the screen and watched the two unidentified men showing a couple of some sort of short rifles.

"How do you know they're couriers?"

"Abby was able to catch a part of the dialogue by the movements of their lips." McGee explained. Gibbs exchanged a sly look with her. "We don't know who they are, but they say the rifles come directly from Tel Aviv. They call them… HPS?"

"High Precision Shot." Gibbs spelled out, putting on a flustered face. "Their range can reach about one mile, if they're well-projected. They can hit a target with chirurgical precision, but this is what I know from my Marine years," He sighed. "God knows how improved they are nowadays."

McGee shuddered at the thought of someone on the loose with such a powerful weapon, then started the short video.

"This camera is not set to tape this specific area, but it was apparently turned by some seagull which was resting on it. We got lucky, because it was partially unscrewed, otherwise it wouldn't have-"

"Mc-Gee!"

"Sorry, boss." He turned red as Gibbs addressed him a warning look. Apologies were a sign of weakness. "However, it started recording this scene the moment when the two guys show the woman the rifles. They barely look at Houssam, so I reckon the acquirer is the woman." He jumped a few seconds and stopped. "She introduces herself as Malikah Ayda."

Gibbs made to open his mouth to ask something, but McGee anticipated him.

"Abby's working on her, boss." He stated.

"But her identity is even more mysterious than Houssam's, Gibbs." Abby exclaimed from her seat. "I can't find any darn thing about her. No birth certificate, nor any other kind of personal information. It's like she-"

"Popped out of thin air." Gibbs completed for her.

He studied the black and white recording attentively, wondering who that blonde might be. They had nothing but a partially distinguishable face and a name. In more practical terms, they had nothing.

And yet he felt like had had seen that woman before, and he was hardly ever wrong in impressions. If only he could remember where and when.

* * *

**A/N:** _Harah_: Hebrew curse meaning "shit".

Let me know what you think, I always appreciate your opinions.


	5. Ziva's Weak Spot

Qasim Houssam watched the back of the leather armchair, waiting for his boss to speak. The two cops were safely locked in the basement and they had been deprived of any kind of weapon or mean of communication with the world. The girl, as the boss had warned him, had been rather hard to overcome, even enchained, and he could have defended a fortress with all the weapons she had with her.

"Have you been kind to our guests, Quasim?" said the low, womanly voice of the boss. "Gentle?"

Houssam bowed lightly with respect in the dimness of the study, surrounded by tall shelves filled up with books. This new house they had moved to looked a little too creepy for his tastes, superstitious as he was, but he knew what the boss thought of superstitions, so he just kept this to himself.

"I did what you wanted, Madam." He said obsequiously. "I left everything in the room, as you bade."

Facing the window behind the desk, the woman's head nodded.

"How's the girl?"

"She's losing a lot of blood, Madam." Houssam hesitated, as though he wasn't sure that was the right answer. "She fought when I tried to search her, but she's weak."

Nothing happened for long seconds. Houssam watched his boss muse in silence with no eyesight of her expression. Then, just when he less expected it, she resolutely turned around on her armchair and stood on her feet, her tall slender silhouette standing out in the golden light of the sunset. A cold, heartless smirk sprang on her lips.

"I'll take care of her."

-------

"Gotcha!" Abby jumped up in front of her computer, fingering the screen excitedly.

"Tell me that scream means good news, Abbs." Gibbs said, walking in the room carrying a mint and strawberry slushie for her.

Abby managed to snag the juicy prize from him just before he could slip it out of her reach, but her triumphant grin was big enough to prevent him from complaining.

"Tony's cell-phone. I got it. Its signal has been off so far, because of some interferences due to the consistent affluence of ships in the port, I suppose. Their radars are so powerful that create this-"

"Ab-by!"

"In a moment I'll be able to tell you their precise localisation. Well, the localisation of Tony's cell-phone, at least."

Gibbs's face became wistful as his brows furrowed.

"If the radars are no longer interfering, this means…"

"They must be at least one mile away from the shipyard." Abby nodded vehemently, shaking her pigtails.

"It's better than nothing." Meanwhile, Abby's eyes darted up and down the screen eagerly, devouring the information she had just got. It was a moment before she frowned and then jumped up in daze, eyes wide in shock.

"Jethro, you won't believe this!"

He approached her at once, demanding to be updated.

"Test me." he told her hastily. Abby's shimmering look lay upon him with a short emphatic pause.

"Tony's cell." She said with a disbelieving tone. "It's… Coming here."

Before she could add anything, Gibbs blurted out some thanks and blasted out of the lab like a hurricane.

-------

"Be extremely careful, I want Gibbs's guys to come out unharmed. Yes, unharmed, or you'd better start looking for a new job… No… complicated op… she's dangerous… Chameleon has to be… Officer David's life…"

Evelyn's voice was audible through the door of the room Jen had temporarily settled for her, but Gibbs could catch only fragments of her conversation on the phone with an unknown interlocutor. The little he heard, though, was enough to make him suspicious.

He slammed the door open, not even bothering to knock or ascertain nobody else was inside, and Evelyn turned to him from the desk, prompting a nonchalant smile. Out of the corner of his eye he saw her hand slip her cell-phone into her purse.

"Jethro," she greeted brightly. "What can I-?"

"What was that?" he barked. She blinked innocently, only getting to fuel his fury. "That damn Chameleon thing, Evelyn!"

She lingered one moment, then sat back on the desk and folded her arms. She cast him a helpless glance before looking at the ground.

"It's none of NCIS's business, Jethro." She said stiffly. "Least of all yours."

Gibbs walked in front of her and enclosed her in between his arms, hands planted on the desk. He hoped his threatening look was eloquent enough.

"Eve, I want to know what you know. _Everything_. Right now."

But she didn't seem very touched by his bluntness. Her excessive surreptitiousness, however, spoke volumes.

"It's complicated, Jethro." She sighed. "I'm not allowed to tell-"

He slammed a fist onto the wooden surface, making her wince slightly.

"Tony and Ziva might be dead," he hissed sourly. "I'm not going to just buy these vice-director bubblings of yours. Just tell me what the hell you know."

"I can't." she spelt strictly through her teeth.

"Evelyn, you were one of our own, once." He continued, relenting a bit. "I _refuse_ to believe you've forgotten what it's like to be cut out by superiors." He regarded her the old way, when the two of them had been so much more than colleagues. Or friends. "There's a chance my guys are alive, you can't ask me to wait until you get a stupid permission!"

Evidently shaken by his passionate speech, Evelyn bit her lip and gave up the confrontation.

"She wants revenge."

"Malikah Ayad?"

He noted Evelyn didn't question him about how he know about that woman. She had written on her face that her job was to know everything about anyone any time, and now he new she was truly the top in the field. She nodded her head yes, gravely, as if there was something implicit he didn't know.

"Formerly known as Hasmia Haswari."

And it was then that the world fell. Gibbs couldn't remember the last time he had felt his heart pound in his throat, but it had been very, very long ago. Decades, probably.

"Ari's mother."

"We found out her death was a fake, six months ago. She changed her identity, that is why the op is called Chameleon." Evelyn began pacing back and forth, hands joined behind her back. He could tell she was nervous, even though nobody else would have noticed. "We've been keeping an eye on her since then. I have proofs that she has had Ziva spied for one year, at least."

Gibbs didn't know what to do. It was the first time in ages, and it was rather disorientating. For the second time around in a couple of years, someone was hitting a little too close to home.

"She's had a year to kill her…" he reasoned, more to himself than to her. "Why to wait so long if her intention is to kill her?"

He raised his gaze to her at her silence. He knew its meaning way too well, he's had to unmask it so many times in the past that he'd lost the count.

"Eve?"

He was literally begging her. If this wouldn't work – if recognising she was the actual leader wouldn't work – then nothing would. It was the last card he could play.

"According to what we retrieved," she declared weakly. "They were studying her life, her habits, her frequentations, her-"

"Affections." Awareness suddenly shone through his features. Evelyn pivoted like a prioress on a scarifical lamb. He shuddered as she addressed him the most intense gaze he'd ever got from her. It was scary.

"Hasmia wanted to be sure to hit a weak spot."

Gibbs cursed under his breath, clenching his fists.

"DiNozzo…"

Evelyn watched him wide-eyed as her brain put two and two together.

"You mean-?"

"We need to find them." He cut her off brusquely. "Explanations-"

"Later. Sure."

"Do we have a potential location?"

"Well…"

Gibbs's cell-phone rang the moment he and Evelyn crossed the doorway. He grabbed it and flipped it open with a jittery gesture.

"Yes?"

McGee's voice spoke from the other side.

"_Boss, something very weird has just arrived. You won't believe…_"

"Elaborate, McGee."

A brief hesitation.

"_It's Tony and Ziva's badges, cell-phones and weapons_. _And there's an envelope, too_. _From Ziva, it seems_."

No good news. Hasmia had sent them a very eloquent message by sending that stuff. He knew she was smart and capable enough to make sure they wouldn't be able to find any clue about her location. Tony and Ziva's location.

"Did you open it?" Gibbs asked, speeding up his pace through the hallway.

"Nope."

"Then do it, McGee!" he snapped. "I'm getting down there." He flipped the phone closed and turned back to Evelyn, following him closely. "We gotta go. Chameleon's just told us she rules the game."

-------

When Tony finally became conscious again, he found out his surroundings consisted on a uncluttered dark room, probably a basement, that smelled of dust and iron. A small light bulb hanging from the dirty ceiling sent a faint sallow light down on the floor. Ziva lay in a filthy corner, right across from him, just awakening. He tried to reach her, but something kept him. They were both cuffed to solid pipes. He had a memory blackout of how they had ended up there, but judging by the dizzy feeling he had, he reckoned they had been drugged.

"Ziva…" He called. "Hey, Ziva!"

She blinked from her supine position, checking around in mild disorientation. Their weapons and badges were nowhere to be seen.

"It was about time that you'd wake up." Said a voice they didn't know.

It took them a while to note there was a woman sitting on a chair a couple of metres from them.

Ziva could see she was wearing a kaki pants suit and black leather boots whose heels looked sharp enough to kill. Maybe that was exactly their purpose.

The mysterious woman left the chair, and Tony managed to spot a pair of cold ice coloured eyes in the dim light. Eyes he discovered he knew.

He blazed a glance to Ziva, getting an eyeful of her astounded expression. Apparently unable to move a muscle, she stared gaping at the woman standing in front of them, wide-eyed in shock. She knew those eyes, too.

"_Shalom_, Ziva David." The blond-haired woman spoke in a low rough voice, with a mild Arab accent, taking a step into the cone of light. She looked about in her middle forties, but Tony was sure she was at least five years older. She was slender and very fit for her age, and he couldn't help noticing she was also rather attractive. Nevertheless, it gave him chills to see such intense hatred in her gelid look.

He watched her couch next to a very weak Ziva, rolling her face toward herself with the barrel of her purse-sized Colt. He writhed, the chains clattering loud in the thick silence of the room, but in vain. Despite the effort, he only got the cuffs to dig sharp cuts into his wrists.

"Those handcuffs have been sharpened expressly to discourage you two from trying to escape." The woman said, without even turning to him. "I suggest you not insist, or I'll have to use more convincing methods."

She trailed the gun all along Ziva's face and pinned it under her chin. Ziva's eyes blinked her image into focus for a couple of seconds, and the evil chuckle she saw froze her blood inside her veins. It was way too well-known, even if she couldn't tell why.

"Well well," the woman begun with a creepy smile. "You and I seem to have a couple of men in common, sweetheart, don't we?" She pressed the top of the gun deeper into Ziva's flesh, delighting at her eyes oozing hostility. "You have your father's eyes. Unlike your brother…"

The ringing bell in Ziva's mind exploded like a bomb at that statement, crashing painfully against the walls of her mind. A shiver of terror ran across her spine as she weakly returned the hateful acrimony of her captivator's manners.

"Leave her alone!" spit out Tony, lunging furiously in their direction

The woman tutted with a light shake of the head.

"I lead the game, Special Agent DiNozzo, so stay quiet, or my finger might slip." She threateningly scratched her red lacquered nail on the trigger, causing Tony's pulse to increase crazily, then, with a rapid feline movement, she planted the gun in Ziva's side, hitting on intention the wounded spot. Ziva felt like the air was being forcefully sucked out of her lungs.

Tony's heart shattered as he heard her suffocated scream of pain.

"How rude of me, I haven't even introduced myself." She brought the free hand to her chest in mock desolation. "I don't expect you to remember of me, Ziva. We met only once, when you were three years old." she said with feigned sweetness, then paused emphatically, flashing Tony a blood-freezing smile that did not reach her familiar-looking impenetrable eyes. Ari's eyes. "Hasmia Haswari, currently and officially known as Malikah Ayda. Very nice to meet you both." Her look roamed southward to Ziva. "You in particular."

Ziva told herself she should have known better than to believe an Hamas agent deceased. Hadn't Ari died by her own hand just before her eyes, in fact, she would have never trusted the news of his death.

Now she knew where the stitches on her wound came from. What she couldn't explain was why Hasmia had bothered to suture a potentially fatal injury to the woman she was now threatening to kill. Unless, of course, she wanted her alive for other objectives.

"I take it you're not as dead as you're supposed to be." She hazarded throatily. Hasmia let out a low wicked laugh.

"Right back from the grave, my dear." She sourly confirmed. "It's easier to do your job when everyone thinks you're buried six feet under the ground." A sneer formed on her lips. "No more bills, no more taxes, and nobody comes looking for you when someone dies by _suspicious causes_." She thrust the gun deeper, and Ziva squeezed her eyes stoically, stifling another pained cry.

"What do you want from her?" Tony bellowed, anger raging through his words.

"Oh, nothing important." Hasmia smiled in the scariest way Tony had ever seen. "I just want to get even with what she took from my son."

Horror painted on Tony's blanched face. Ziva didn't know whether to believe her or not.

"And who's going to get even for all Ari took?" he barked.

"Tony, shut up!"

Temporarily forgetting of Ziva, Hasmia scrutinised him for long seconds, and it was obvious she had no good deed. She stood on her feet and neared him, the Colt pointed to the ground, but perpetually alert. She came to face Tony with an unrecognisable expression.

"What are you supposed to be?" She slammed a booted foot in his stomach, causing him to fall facedown, coughing out saliva mixed with blood. His guts felt completely pulped. "Are you her tomboy? Her new little friend?" Her despising derision echoed within the walls. "This little missy doesn't have a heart, my naïve loverboy." She set her heel in the middle of his back, over the spine line, her head callously bent to one side. Tony's whole body was aching, every fiber of it sending acute pangs to his core.

"Really?" He found it hard to speak, his voice suffocated deep in his chest. "What about your baby boy? He killed my friend, two years ago."

Another violent kick collided with his ribs, breaking a couple of them with a dreadful crack. More blood trickled at the corners of his mouth.

"Dare mention my son again and the next one is for girlie." she warned, referring to Ziva.

She returned to her in silence, moving every step with calibrated slowness. Ziva's mind was racing to try to understand what that woman's real intents were.

Had her intention been to kill her, she would have done it immediately, but she hadn't, so it had to be something else. Perhaps she wanted to torture her, before giving her the final stroke. That explained why she was sill alive, and also why Tony was, too. Hasmia could want to use him to inflict her an appropriate punishment, and, in that case, she really didn't know how to prevent it.

If Hasmia wanted her life she could have it, but involving Tony in a personal issue was not an option. It wasn't at all.

"I wonder what your father would feel like if I killed you." Hasmia mused, pacing around her like a vulture. "His precious last daughter…"

She knelt on one knee and grasped Ziva by her hair, pulling her a few inches up from the floor. Ziva sucked in between her teeth. Hasmia approached her mouth to her ear, gazing at Tony with an evil smirk, and whispered.

"What does it feel like to switch from predator to prey, honey?"

* * *

TBC... 


End file.
